


Now I Shall Slumber Sweetly

by Meduseld



Category: Aquaman (2018), Aquaman (Comics), DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alien Biology, Cultural Differences, Dubious Consent, Incest, M/M, Prison, Royalty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-02
Updated: 2019-02-02
Packaged: 2019-10-21 06:01:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17637176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meduseld/pseuds/Meduseld
Summary: Arthur has trouble sleeping. And understanding Orm.





	Now I Shall Slumber Sweetly

Privately, Arthur will cop to showing a ten-year-old-boy level of excitement when he discovers that Atlantis’ Royal Palace has honest-to-God secret passages.

It’s dulled by the third week, when he’s discovered that a seat of government never stops, and that they’re really just ways to get around without getting accosted by fifty-two courtiers or ministers or heads of whatever the hell, especially when he’s just woken up and needs to head off a crisis. When he’d first seen Orm he’d thought the golden armor was pretentious. Now he wonders if he can get away with sleeping in it.

Arthur’s temper isn’t exactly long at the best of times, and living in the non-stop chaos of the aftermath of what nearly turned out to be a planet-wide war, with only about an hour of sleep on average, just makes it worse.

It was probably what Vulko was really thinking, keeping him out of sight of the more traditional nobles an easily shocked dignitaries, when he showed Arthur the secret doors, molded into the palace walls.

He’s memorized the winding passages by now, spending more and more of his nights restlessly pacing there, where he won’t be watched, than in his rooms. The spaces are too big and cold to feel like home, anyway.

They were his mother’s, once, and he still can’t quite square that with himself.

In the day he’s mostly sharp, still, flooded with helpless adrenaline in front of a thousand myriad issues, taxes and legislation and postal concerns. Vulko helps. And Orm does too, when Arthur gets up the courage to ask. His brother was a good king, he knows, until the end. Bred to it like a prized hound, he’s been told. Economics lessons by age five, when Arthur was playing with action figures.

He’s so out of sorts he lets Orm’s jab go. Or he does after correcting him from “dolls”.

Between them and Mera, the days work themselves out for the most part, with no new wars started, accidentally or on purpose.

In the night, though, his thoughts go sticky and slippery, just out of reach. A state like sleep, no matter how far he feels from rest.

He’s somewhere in the walls between the third and fourth stories, idly thinking about how they count them top down, not like on the surface, when he hears it.

In the near dark, someone is singing.

Arthur can’t make out the words.

But the voice is sad and sweet and haunting. Like a bird in a cage, longing to be free.

For a moment he laughs, almost sure he’s fallen asleep in the middle of the corridor.

That’s when he remembers just where he is, and knows who he’s hearing. He visits often enough to have wandered back when half gone to sleep on his feet.

The nearest way out of the dark hallway takes him to the far end of the cells, the ones known as pearl oysters, because historically they’ve housed scheming royals and misbehaving nobles.

Vulko had been smiling when he said it, one Arthur’s first of many official visits. But the ancient secret doorway he’s using now means that Arthur can get to them directly, no need to pass the guards or announce his presence here.

He hates what it implies.

 _All by a young maiden, my own heart's delight_ sings Orm, from the only cell with someone living in it still.

He’s staring out the windows, images distorted from the security measures, feet paddling idly to keep him upright in the water. Maybe he can’t sleep either.

 _My body is injured_ \- “Hey” Arthur says, hands heavy on the silvery, almost transparent, door.

Orm moves with the grace that comes from years of practice to turn into a smooth bow, eyes flicking defiantly to Arthur’s before turning back to the floor, so quickly he wouldn’t have noticed if Vulko hadn’t pointed out that he did it every time.

“Apologies, my King, for disturbing you” he says, making every word sound like _fuck you._

Arthur kind of loves it.

There’s something to be said about open contempt, instead of the kind that hides behind painted smiles and hereditary titles.

“It was beautiful” he says, dreamily enjoying the surprise flickering in Orm’s face. Arthur seems to be pretty good at keeping him on his toes.

“It’s not one of the official ones” he adds, finally understanding what was nagging at him, stepping into the cell like an afterthought.

It’s probably a bad idea but he can’t bring himself to care.

Everything is shrouded in dream logic, every course of action perfectly reasonable, even when it isn’t.

And anyway he wants to know what he heard.

Arthur’s had more than one crash course in the songs he has to know, the ones that recite history or politics or ceremony. Orm probably knew them by heart by age four.

But this one doesn’t sound like those, not in the words or the feeling, which is almost familiar.

Maybe he’s just that sleep deprived.

“It’s not” Orm admits, turning back to the window, just as Arthur breaks into a jaw cracking yawn.

It helps deal with how, through the lines of code and energy threaded through it, Atlantis looks like a funhouse mirror of itself, smeared on the glass carelessly and almost mockingly, barely recognizable.

He can’t imagine what it’s like to watch that, day in and day out, fundamentally wrong in the worst uncanny valley kind of way. And Arthur doesn’t even know the city’s skyline by heart yet. It must be worse for Orm. Isn’t everything about this?

He shakes his head and the thoughts fall out sideways.

He’s just so tired. The only thing he can hold on to is the song.

“Was it the kind you might hear in a bar?” he says, moving closer, enjoying the way the weak light plays along Orm’s face.

The water is warmer too, from the heat of his skin.

His brother doesn’t flinch.

If anything, he seems to relax. Which doesn’t fit.

But Arthur feels half-drunk with exhaustion, and the only thought in the forefront of his mind now is that he wants to hear Orm sing again.

“Perhaps” he says and Arthur belatedly remembers Orm’s reputation amongst his troops, of leading from the front, of the pride they took in the way he’d practically been raised in a barracks.

No quarter from the very start, they liked to whisper when Arthur passed in hallways.

Orm had sung like it was a comfort to him.

It must be like any other soldier song Arthur’s ever heard, above water and below. No wonder it was familiar.

He realizes he’s smiling at the back of Orm’s head like an idiot, his brother still and patient before him, and he clears his throat, starting to think of something to say.

Arthur’s standing very close now, without realizing it, and the tickle of Orm’s hair, no longer neat without access to his vanity table or scissors, keeps stealing his train of thought.

Whatever words he’d half-formed die at the look on Orm’s face when he turns, as if he can’t wait any longer.

Ecstatic, in the old fashioned sense of the word, like the marble statues he and Mera had seen in rapture inside Italian churches on their quest for the trident.

“Have you come to kill me?” Orm says and he sounds at peace.

Or eager, even. Looks it too.

“What the fuck” Arthur says, before he can stop himself, sleep deprived enough to know he might not have heard that right.

That’s what he hopes, anyway.

He thought they were over this, but then again, he’s stealthily slipped into his brother’s cell in the middle of the night and loomed into his space like he belonged there.

He’s heard stories about other kings that did the same.

Orm is staring, still so hopeful it’s a knife between the ribs.

He remembers the sculptures, and that there’s only one higher power they both recognize.

“Mom said-” Arthur starts, stops, cursing himself for always turning back into a whining child when his brother goads him.

Maybe he’s just fucking with him.  But Orm doesn’t laugh.

“I know. And I know she’ll be on the surface for another month at least” and it tears at Arthur’s heart that he’s so matter of fact, voice steady.

Of course Orm would think that it was all carefully calculated.

“She loves you” is all he can think of to say, to stop this. His skin is crawling, frantic, and there’s no enemy he can see.

Except maybe himself.

He’s just so tired, so scared, words suddenly so _hard_. Orm laughs, bitter, with a manic edge.

“She loved the fat little boy that clung to her skirts. She does not know me, Arthur. And will not love me when she does” he says.

He sounds certain.

It makes something click in Arthur's skull, even though he still feels like he’s thinking through a pool of molasses.

He’d sounded sure in the throne room, when Arthur was chained to the floor, smiling easily.

He’s been wrong before, which is what Arthur says. In Orm’s eyes, he sees that he’s back there too, when he’d been the one in shining gold armor and his brother the one in chains.

He doesn’t come to the same conclusion.

“You wish me to humble myself?” he says, and before Arthur can process what that means, Orm is on his knees before him, graceful even in this.

For the first time since he first learned how to really swim, Arthur can’t breathe under the weight of the water.

“You wish me to beg?” he whispers, bowing his head, and something in Arthur gives way with a crack, like a sheet of ice sloughing off a fjord.

Just as Orm’s lips start to form the word, his hand moves on its own, cupping his jaw, thumb skittering along his lip, pulling him up.

Orm’s skin is unexpectedly soft, yielding, and Arthur presses his fingertips into his arteries, the ones in his neck that are so incredibly human, suddenly reveling in the proof that Orm is alive, pulse thudding dully in his throat.

His eyes lock on Arthur’s, still so calm, almost _dead_ , and there’s something wild coming alive inside Arthur.

His kiss is brutal, splitting Orm’s lower lip and flooding both their mouths with blood.

His lips feel like marble until they don’t.

Orm meets him, hard and angry, fingers fisted tight in Arthur’s hair.

No hesitation from either of them, like this really is a dream where the rules don’t matter.

There’s enough fight in Orm to make it clear that he’s still there, still _alive_ , even after all the mess.

And there’s a hunger in him too, just a step behind the one in Arthur at the first brush of skin on skin.

He can’t remember the last time he’s been touched, even the last battles of his brother’ war had been fought mostly at a distance, through foot soldiers and sea creatures.

It was probably a blow from Orm himself. From the way he keens and arches up into Arthur’s rough touch, it’s been a while for him too, probably longer.

And longer before that for it to be in a way that didn’t hurt, he thinks.

Orm bites at his lips and Arthur, feeling reckless, sticks his tongue right in his mouth, sliding past his sharp teeth.

The noise he makes is something between indignation and satisfaction. Inside, he’s soft, slick, and so, so hot.

His baby brother, so cold on the outside, so prim and pristine, practically frigid, coming apart with every hard stroke of Arthur’s tongue. He always did have a taste for wrecking things, tearing them apart with his own hands.

He’s almost Orm’s only living blood and he’s pawing between his legs like this is something he’s owed. Orm might even agree that he is.

Arthur’s skin feels almost too tight for him, like he’s bursting at the seams, happy to tear his clothes away at Orm’s insisting hands.

Maybe he just wants them to match for once, to be equally naked. He can feel the energy coursing through them, between them, like a live wire.

His- _their_ bodies are thrumming, over-sensitized and overwhelmed, and alive, alive, alive.

It’s brutal when it happens, when they fully cross the line, impossibly sudden no matter how obviously they’re careening toward it. 

Orm’s legs wrap around his hips and then in a heartbeat Arthur’s as deep inside his body as he can possibly go. 

Orm gasps against his ear at the press of it, the unrelenting shove, and it’s more musical to him than the song. The pain of it is sweet to them both. 

“ _Please_ ” he whispers and Arthur hips snap forward like he’s been shocked into it. Orm’s body moves to meet him, pull him in impossibly deeper, all the way down.

They’re pressed together tightly, skin joined by sticky streaks of precome and slick and likely a little blood too flowing from where their bodies are joined.

Arthur’s ribs ache with the pressure.

Orm arches up into his every touch, every _thrust_ , and his slit is tighter and more muscular than any other body Arthur has ever fucked. Like he was made for this.

His thighs squeeze at Arthur’s sides, ankles digging into the divots of his back.

They’re tumbling through the water, scraping themselves up on the walls, bouncing off so hard he’s surprised they don’t break bones. But they don’t stop. Maybe they can’t.

As cruel as it is, his hands are more reverent than they’ve been.

His lips are soft and his words are softer, even when Orm’s fingernails dig so deep into his back he’s surprised they come back out.

Arthur tenderly kisses the tears at the corner of Orm’s eyes, seeping out from the corners, crinkled tightly shut as he has them. It’s like his heart is totally separate from his body, the sharp jerks of his hips and the impossible hardness of his cock.

When Orm comes he doesn’t make a sound, teeth cutting deep into Arthur’s collarbone as he shakes.

His face stays there, skin tucked in so close he can’t tell what belongs to who, for what feels like eons as Arthur’s body fucks and fucks and fucks like it really is inexhaustible.

When he finally finishes it feels like his come is slowly drawn out of him like a draining wound.

Arthur drops his head on Orm’s chest with a growl. He doesn’t slip out.

It’s weirdly comfortable, to feel their lungs moving in sync, taking in the same breaths.

He can feel his brother’s heartbeat against his cheek.

And around his cock, further down.

After a minute, Orm’s hands tentatively move up to stroke his hair like skittish birds. It breaks him out of the half daze he’s slipped into.

Orm’s just so warm, smells so good, no perfumes or jewels or armor anymore. Just himself.

“You’re not going anywhere” he half yawns into his skin. Orm’s hands still.

“No one’s taking you away” he mumbles, eyes slipping shut.

He might have imagined it, but right before he falls asleep he thinks Orm starts to sing.

*

“-hur. Arthur. Arthur!” says whoever is cutting into Arthur’s very deep sleep.

He bats idly at the hands tugging at his hair, curling closer around the warm, yielding body he’s wrapped around.

Which is when he realizes he’s not in his own bed, or his own quarters, and somehow, worst of all, he’s slipped out of Orm in the night.

When he finally slits open his eyes with a groan, just as annoyed as always that they still get gritty underwater, the light is the weak grey-pink of dawn.

Or maybe it just seems darker because they’ve floated into a ceiling corner overnight. The cells are annoyingly small, after all.

The word leaves a sour taste in his mouth and he tightens his arms around Orm, even more irritated.

“S’early” and he can’t remember the last time he’d slept so well or so long. He buries his face back in Orm’s chest.

Even if some distant part of his brain is starting to wail like a car alarm somewhere far away on the block.

“You must go. Now” Orm insists, even though he still isn't disentangling their bodies either.

He’s infuriatingly awake.

It’s entirely possible he never slept.

Funny, how easy it was to picture that, Orm staying up out of sheer stubbornness. Or paranoia. Or maybe he just wanted to see Arthur drool.

He’s still talking, distantly, but Arthur doesn’t want to track the words.

“The guards are coming soon” he says, urgent, and that hits home, finally wakes Arthur the rest of the way up.

“Fuck” he says, scrubbing at his face. “Not now” Orm says and Arthur genuinely can’t tell if it’s a joke.

Or an invitation.

He’s not dressed, exactly, neither of them are, but they’re not undressed, either. It’s kind of a problem.

“Why do you want me to go?” he says suddenly, trying to tug his pants back on while they’re still half in a ball from where they drifted down in the night. It’s kind of a miracle their clothes are still in one piece, no obvious tears.

Orm stares at him like he’s grown a second head.

“The scandal alone would-” “Get me off the throne. Isn’t that what you want?”

For a moment, the incandescent, apocalyptic rage in Orm’s face makes Arthur think that maybe they’re still in battle, trident against trident, and Arthur’s not winning after all.

“I cannot take the throne now, after this” he spits, and then the fire leaves his face.

“And I would not entrust it to another. Atlantis would fall, as surely as the tides” he says, mostly to himself, his curled up hands.

 He does look dressed, now, the way Arthur doesn’t.

The simple tunic thing assigned to prisoners is a lot simpler, after all, even more grey and non-descript in the light. It’s good cloth, at least, but that can’t be much comfort.

Arthur puts his hands over Orm’s.

It’s only a moment before Orm pulls them away, but it’s enough.

He nods, which Arthur thinks means he’s presentable enough to sneak back to his quarters without much trouble.

From how rested he feels, he might actually be ready for a day at the throne.

And maybe sleep with come easier now. If not, he knows what to do. Who to see.

“I’ll be back later” Arthur says as he goes and Orm nods vaguely, already turning to the window.

“I want to hear you sing again” he adds and he knows, even without looking, that Orm had smiled.  

**Author's Note:**

> The title is from [_I Am Weary (Let Me Rest)_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeKnZnrGhLg) which is incredibly fitting for these two. The song Orm sings is a bastardization of[ _The Unfortunate Rake_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unfortunate_Rake) which came mostly from the amazing version heard in [_The Ballad of Buster Scruggs_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tc0zPPEW650) and the fact that Patrick Wilson [sings like an angel.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qe5BC-Ke9iY)


End file.
